Sculpting with Air: Ian McMahon and Jong Oh

Linde Gallery, Foster Galleries

This spring, two contemporary sculptors will create very different site-specific artworks at deCordova by shaping the intangible element of air. Ian McMahon creates voluminous, pillow-like forms using an innovative technique of sprayed plaster. Jong Oh fashions almost imperceptible structures with string, wire, and Plexiglas. While McMahon emphasizes materiality, solidity, and containment, Oh focuses on transparency, lightness, and expansiveness. Despite the enormous contrasts, the two sculptors’ work is complementary. Both reshape space by exploring tension, balance, and force. They challenge our perceptions of gravity and perspective by creating forms that expand into the galleries.

At deCordova, McMahon’s sculpture will be over 65 feet long and 25 feet wide—his largest and most complex sculpture to date. Oh’s installation will weave between two adjoining galleries, extending from one room into the other.

Organized by Martina Tanga, Koch Curatorial Fellow.

Support for this exhibition is generously provided by Sherry and Joel Mallin, Kumi and Bill Martin, The Nathaniel Saltonstall Arts Fund, Mary and Donald Shockey, Jr., and an anonymous donor.

Jong Oh, Between Two Rooms (Monochrome) #1 (detail), 2018, string, weights, Plexiglas, metal chains, graphite, paint, dimensions variable, Courtesy of Jong Oh and Marc Strauss Gallery.

Jong Oh, Between Two Rooms (Monochrome) #1 (detail), 2018, string, weights, Plexiglas, metal chains, graphite, paint, dimensions variable, Courtesy of Jong Oh and Marc Strauss Gallery, Photog

Ian McMahon, Tether (detail), 2018, plaster, steel hardware, 65 x 12’, Courtesy of the Artist, Photograph by Clements Photography and Design, Boston.